


Hugs for Hope

by TheCrowMaiden



Category: Final Fantasy XIII
Genre: Fluff, Gen, Hugs, Team as Family, all platonic found family type stuff, basically hope needs lots of hugs from his new brothers and sisters, mild talk of violence and wounds
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-30
Updated: 2016-11-30
Packaged: 2018-09-03 10:08:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,216
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8708392
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheCrowMaiden/pseuds/TheCrowMaiden
Summary: Also known as: a few of the times Hope got a hug from one of his new family members for a few different reasons. Pure family fluff (with a tiny bit of a bittersweet ending).





	

**i.**

Hope yelped as the Behemoth lunged for him, casting thunder more out of reflex than intent as he scrambled backwards. The sudden flash blinded the beast and stopped it mid charge as it shook its head, teeth bared to sink into Hope as soon as it could see him again. But it never got the chance. The instant it let its guard down, Snow and Lightning were upon it with a vengeance. After a brief onslaught Lightning’s gunblade sank hilt-deep into the Behemoth’s side and the beast fell over with a choked roar, dead before it hit the grass.

Last time they had fought one of the huge Pulsian beasts that didn’t respond to Snow’s aggressive taunts, Hope had been knocked senseless before he could remember he could use magic. He had frozen out of panic, been hit, and woken up sometime later to everyone but Fang hovering over him anxiously.

This time, all he had were a couple scrapes from falling down. Hope hadn’t been conscious to see the end of any of the fights yet on Pulse, apart from his battle with Alexander, and he wasn’t quite sure what to do.

“Way to go, kiddo!” Snow cheered, and solved Hope’s quandary by swinging him up and enveloping him in a bear hug.

Snow was so tall that Hope’s feet were nowhere near the ground, and he laughed breathlessly as he was squeezed tightly. It wasn’t uncomfortable though and Hope never failed to be amazed at how Snow, who could shatter bones with his punches, could hug Hope so tight and never hurt him. The feeling of shock from the fight melted away and Hope clung to Snow’s broad shoulders, grinning at Lightning who was rolling her eyes at them as she wiped her weapon clean on a scrap of cloth.

“Don’t go breaking him and finishing what the Behemoth tried to start,” Lightning said, punching Snow lightly in the back after sheathing her gunblade.

“Our Hope’s too tough for that,” Snow replied, giving Hope one last squeeze before putting him down. “Right?”

“Right!” Hope gave Snow a friendly shove, and picked up his boomerang. He wouldn’t have said anything even if he did get a little bruised; he liked getting hugged over something happy for once.

**ii.**

It took a while for Fang to find their group a cave that didn’t have anything too big for her, Sazh, and Vanille to take down on their own. Apparently the Megistotherians slept in caves, and were less than pleased to be walked in on. They’d had a couple close calls before Fang had noticed the cave with the opening too small to admit anything much bigger than themselves. The fluorescent leech-like creatures they did find that swarmed the floor were disposed of easily and mostly harmless anyway, leaving them with a safe place to rest.

They could have handled the Megistotherian and found a place sooner if Lightning and Snow had been available to fight, but Lightning was still out cold and Snow was fully committed to carrying her and keeping her safe.

Hope chewed his lip as he fidgeted on the stone ledge where they were setting Lightning so he could finally apply proper healing magic to her wounds. After he had let the cure spells sink into her cracked ribs and begin to bind her gashed skin together, Hope fussed with her short cape, tucking it around her as he never would have presumed to if she was awake.

Midway through brushing Lightning’s hair off her pale and bloodied face, Hope caught Snow looking at him with sad sympathy and stopped.

“She’s not going to blame you,” Snow said, patting Hope on the shoulder. “Light would have been a lot more angry if you had healed her and got knocked out yourself.”

That was probably true, but Hope still blamed himself. He shrugged off Snow’s comforting hand, and sat back down next to Lightning to keep an eye on her breathing.

After everyone had gone to sleep and Hope had convinced them to let him take Lightning’s usual first watch, he felt the tears burning at the back of his eyes. All he wanted was to keep his friends safe, and he had failed spectacularly. If Snow didn’t have the durability of Pulse automata for some reason, they all probably would have died before Fang got to them.

Tears were running down his cheeks before he noticed and Hope tried to gulp down his sobs. He managed to keep them down to the occasional gasp, and wiped his face on his neck kerchief.

“Crying counts as being preoccupied on watch.”

Hope spun around at the quiet comment, and choked when he saw Lightning leaning against the natural wall of the cave.

“Light! You, you shouldn’t…You should be sleeping.”

Ignoring his stammering, Lightning walked over to Hope, and cupped his cheeks in her hands. Her movements were stiff, and Hope couldn’t help when another bout of tears welled up in his eyes. She wiped them away impassively and then, slowly, crouched so that they were the same height.

She pulled Hope into her, wrapping her arms around him with one hand pressing his head into the crook of her neck. Steady and still as stone, her hands were nonetheless gentle as she hugged him close.

“It’s okay, Hope.” She told him quietly. “It’s okay.”

And if she minded that he cried into her shoulder as she held him for the rest of the watch, Lightning never mentioned it.

**iii.**

Red as a Flandragora, Hope covered his face with his hands as Fang roared with laughter on the other side of the camp. Giggling along with Fang, Vanille was wearing Snow’s coat and Hope wished the man was in it instead of scouting for food with Lightning so Hope could hide behind him. He wished Lightning was back too, because she had the best chance of making Fang stop laughing.

“So, what happened?” Sazh sat next to Hope, and dropped the Chocobo chick onto the boy’s head with a smile.

Hope’s only response was to groan, so Sazh nudged him with his elbow. It was just a light jab, but when it didn’t get a response Sazh nudged him a little harder.

“Come on, kid. You know Fang is going to tell the others when they get back anyway. Might as well tell me now.”

Hope groaned again, and peeked at Sazh through his fingers. His nose still felt red, although judging by the lack of heat in his cheeks the rest of the excess colour seemed to have faded for the time being. It helped that Fang had stopped laughing for the moment, her and Vanille organizing some of their supplies and talking in the easy way that made them seem like they were more sisters than friends.

“You don’t… really think she will, do you?” Hope asked finally, his face starting to burn again as he thought about Fang telling everyone about his blunder.

“Yeah, I think she would.”

The Chocobo chick chirped at Hope, flitting from his shoulder to his lap a couple times before returning to Sazh’s hair and disappearing from sight as was its usual practice. Hope thought maybe it would be easier to just tell Sazh now so there was one less person to laugh at him later, and he took a deep breath and held it a moment before he spoke.

“I went to the river in the ravine to fill the canteen, and Vanille was washing up and when I realized I turned around too fast and I ran into the ravine wall.”

To Hope’s dismay, Sazh did laugh. But a moment later Sazh threw an arm around Hope’s shoulders and pulled him into his side, still chuckling.

“Is that all? I wouldn’t be worried about Fang telling the others about that, all Snow and Lightning will do is fuss over if you’re hurt. Pair of worrywarts, those two.”

“You think?” Hope brightened, seeing the truth of the statement, and rubbed at his definitely still-sore nose.

“Nah. I know,” Sazh replied, and ruffled Hope’s hair.

**vi.**

Chunks of the ground had broken away to make a jagged edge, and the cliff went straight down from it. Hope couldn’t even see to the bottom. The ground crumbled further when he tried to peer over the rim, and he gulped and backed up into Fang.

“I can’t jump from here!”

“Use your Eidolon!” Fang snapped, jabbing her spear at the tongue of the wyvern when it tried to snatch her in its beak.

“But I haven’t summoned him on purpose before!”

Swooping down, the wyvern whipped its tail in a circle, knocking both of the l’Cie flat. Fang was back up in an instant, yanking Hope out of the way of the next attack that nearly took hs head off. She sank her spear into the wyvern’s eye when it over extended its neck, and when it pulled back with a screech she roughly turned Hope to face her and shook him.

“You don’t have a choice, kid! You need to jump!”

“I can’t!”

There was a long pause as she glared at him, and then she sighed.

“Alright, alright.”

Fang sighed again, and put her arm around his shoulders, hugging him as she ruffled his hair in understanding. Hope relaxed and let her gently move him so he was behind her, still with one arm holding him close. In front of them, the wyvern flapped its wings and came toward them once again with its beak open and tail lashing in fury. Fang looked at it, and then at Hope, and smiled.

“Sorry, kid.”

And she pushed him off the cliff.

By instinct, as Fang had likely intended, Hope summoned Alexander and with its protection safely hit the ground several fraught seconds later. Heart hammering in his chest, Hope climbed on top of his Eidolon’s shoulders and scowled at Fang as she came sailing down on Bahamut's back. The cliff above them was starting to fall to pieces from the wide scale destruction of her and her Eidolon’s attack and Hope had to hang on tightly as Alexander surged forward to follow Fang back towards their camp.

“You tricked me!” Hope yelled at Fang as she grinned at him.

“It worked didn’t it? You should have been suspicious when I hugged you!”

**v.**

Oerba was eerily quiet after they had fought their way through it, clearing the streets of moaning, shuffling Cieth. Though the houses were derelict, they didn’t move or make noise. The crystal dust muffled everything; even the ancient floorboards didn’t creak like Hope expected them to.

Maybe that was why Hope had had a nightmare.

He sat out on the little balcony of the house they had decided to use, watching the broken sign across the street flutter in the faint breeze and fainter light. The metal rails were cool and he pressed his forehead against them, and sighed.

When something warm pressed against his side, Hope turned to smile weakly at Vanille. In the predawn light her hair and clothing practically glowed, so he had seen her sitting on the window ledge keeping watch. It wasn’t surprising that she had come to sit next to him, any of them would have, but only Vanille would start cuddling into him without saying anything first.

“Had a bad dream,” Hope said in answer when she hummed enquiringly at him, pulling back from the rail to lean against her instead.

“What was it about?” Vanille asked, her voice bright even when she was almost whispering. “Was it about your brand?”

“No.” Hope shook his head. “It was about everyone, except…Everyone was gone. You had all left, or died, or something. I didn’t have anyone.”

“Hey now!” Vanille pulled away, sat up on her knees and tugged on Hope so he would turn and face her. “We’re not going anywhere! Not ever!”

“How do you know?”

“Because I said so, silly!”

Vanille threw her arms around Hope and pulled him into a tight embrace so they were cheek to cheek. She swayed him side to side almost like she was dancing with him and she hugged him as tightly as she could. The beads on her shirt were digging into Hope’s collarbone, but he started to smile as she hummed each time she dipped him to one side or the other.

When she finally let him go, Hope was grinning, and Vanille was too.

“See?” She said, hands still on his shoulders, “I’m still here. If you have another nightmare, you just find me and I’ll hug you so tight you’ll never doubt it again!”

**vi.**

Hope looked up at the pillar with his heart in his throat, and Lightning put her arm around his shoulders. The others gathered with them, linking arms and holding hands until they were all connected as they looked at what was left of Cocoon. A breeze twined around them all like a crystal whisper, and Hope could hear the words in it.

One with a voice as bright as red hair at dawn and the other as wicked as a helpful shove off a cliff.

_It wasn’t a lie, Hope._

_Yeah kid. We’re still here, and we always will be._

**Author's Note:**

> The 6 main l'Cie are a wonderful found family and no one can convince me otherwise. Also I am making the choice to willfully ignore that FFXIII-2 and Lighting Returns exist because the first game ending was perfect and I don't like the sound of what I've heard of the sequels.


End file.
